Pretentious or practical?

Get the designer look for less.

As much as many people turn their noses up at luxury designers and fashion week catwalks, deeming them to be pretentious and far too overly price, in some respects I totally agree. However I don't think people quite realise how much of an influence top designers such as Dolce & Gabbana, Kenzo, Stella McCartney {and the list could go on}, have on the clothes we choose to wear day-in day-out. Having worked for a high-end fashion company {be it children's or not} for the last year I've worked through three seasons worth of trends: Autumn/Winter '12, Spring/Summer '13 and now Autumn/Winter '13 and have come to realise just how much influence top designers have on the shelves of high-street brands. I now walk into shops and see people on the street and can easily recognise certain prints, some of their brand origin and influences, and which designers introduced which trends to the market. 

Take Kenzo for example, the current it brand featuring the infamous Kenzo tiger print this season, which I have seen mini-me's trickle down through to the children's market with stocks flying off the shelf! Below highlights the influence the designer's famous print had on the runway to Zara's design team. Okay so the print isn't an exact replica but the idea and basic outline resembles that of Kenzo.

The original Kenzo tiger motif jumpers at 195€.

Zara's influence for these jumpers probably came from the best selling Kenzo runway pieces, currently in the sale both selling at 16.99€.  See here and here.

Spot the difference:

One of these pairs of blue spotted trousers, first walked on the British fashion designer, Stella McCartney runway, costs a dear 475€ whilst the other is currently sitting at £12 in the H&M summer sale, but which one's which?

Shop the H&M pair here and Stella McCartney here.

Dolce & Gabbana may just be another pretentious luxury brand, that only celebrities or people with stupid amounts of money can afford, but this season their range of catwalk trends have been seen influencing even Primark's collection! Their Two coloured stripe dress which began life at £1,420 and now sits in the sale at a comfortable {I joke!} £994 has been replicated on shop floors all over the place: Topshop, Oasis, Primark...

But can you tell the difference? Which one is the real £994 D&G dress, which one is the £35 Oasis dress and which one the £12 Primark dress?

...and following on from another big catwalk hit by Dolce & Gabbana and their SS13 Sicilian theme...Oasis took to recreating the trending print.

Oasis' Toby Sicilian Skater Dress is only £50 while the original concept D&G Sicilian Cart Print Sun Dress sells for £462.

I know it's difficult to comprehend spending ludicrous amounts of money on clothing {I totally agree} but without top designers and their creative innovations, creating runway trends, we wouldn't have such interesting rails to peruse through on shopping trips down Oxford Circus, Rue de Rivoli, or even your local high-street, so here's just an insight into where our own wardrobes might have started their lives...

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